Margery Knight

Knight was a lecturer in botany at University of Liverpool from 1912 until she retired in 1954.^[1] She was based at the University’s Port Erin Marine Biological Station on the Isle of Man.

Her research focused on the chromosome numbers and life histories of algae.^[2] The book Manx algae; an algal survey of the south end of the Isle of Man that she published with Mary Parke in 1931 became a standard reference.^[3]

Knight was the doctoral supervisor of Mary Parke, Elsie May Burrows and Helen Blackler.^[2][4]

She was supportive of students, going as far as to provide finance to them from her own personal resources. On her 80th birthday ex-students and colleagues presented her with a tribute of an album of pressed seaweeds and messages.^[1]

Her publications included:

• Manx algae; an algal survey of the south end of the Isle of Man by Margery Knight and Mary Parke, 1931, University of Liverpool Press.
• Knight, Margery (1924) XVII. Studies in the Ectocarpaceae. I. The life-history and cytology of Pylaiella litoralis, Kjellm. Earth and Environmental Science Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh 53 (2) 343–360
• Knight, Margery (1930) XV. Studies in the Ectocarpaceae. II: the life-history and cytology of Ectocarpus siliculosus, Dillw. Earth and Environmental Science Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh 56 (2) 307–332
• Margery Knight and Mary Parke (1950) A biological study of Fucus vesiculosus and F. serratus. Journal of the Marine Biological Association 29 (2) 439 – 515

Her companion was Rose McKenna.^[5] In 1936 Knight was in a car accident that resulted in the loss of one of her legs.^[1] In retirement on the Isle of Man Knight painted landscapes in oil, some of which are in the collection of the University of Liverpool.^[5] She died in 1973.